Five Elements Sealing Jutsu

When Yichen arrived, Bunji immediately walked over to him and briefly explained what had happened.

It turned out that the Five-Tails inside Katsuragi had not suddenly gone berserk. At first, Katsuragi had still been conscious, and the moment he sensed something was wrong, he had someone return to the village to report it.

The Barrier Team and Tsuchikage's Office Building had received the news at almost the same time. Bunji was experienced enough to understand that if Katsuragi had not gone berserk, Lord Tsuchikage alone could have reinforced the seal.

But now that the tailed beast had lost control, the village had only two options: either use a powerful seal, or fight the Five-Tails, exhaust a large amount of its Chakra, and then seal it.

The latter would require enormous sacrifices and was a last resort when there was no other choice. As for the former, Iwagakure had originally possessed no powerful Sealing Jutsu. But now, they at least had a theory: the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu. Though it had never been tested in practice, it was worth a try.

Thus, Bunji had immediately sent the Anbu who delivered the report to find Yichen, because Yichen had proposed the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu and participated in its entire design process. Though he would not be needed for the actual sealing, he could help create the five Sealing Scrolls of different attributes.

Yichen understood the urgency and did not waste words. He directly followed Bunji to Meishe and the others. As for Bunji, he went straight to Ōnoki to report the situation and explain the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu.

Yichen walked over to Meishe, glanced at the materials laid out before them, and asked, "Senior Meishe, are all the materials ready?"

Seeing Yichen arrive, Meishe clearly had known he would come and was not surprised in the least. "They're ready. We were just about to divide up the five elements."

Then, the several seal masters involved in the design, including Yichen, began dividing the work. Yichen was assigned to create the Water Release scroll. It was not because he was showing off; among those capable of creating the Five Elements scrolls, only he and a Jonin who knew A-rank Sealing Jutsu had learned Water Release Transformation.

That Jonin would soon participate in sealing the Five-Tails, so he could not waste Chakra now. Moreover, he did not understand the principles behind the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu, and needed to learn from scratch how to perform it alongside another Jonin who had returned from the battlefield.

Once the work had been assigned, everyone began their tasks. There were three sets of materials before Yichen. The extra two had been specially prepared by Meishe as backups because Yichen's mastery of Water Release was not yet proficient.

Yichen did not rush to begin writing. He first adjusted his condition, then picked up his brush. Although he was not proficient with Water Release, he was the most familiar with the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu, so the chances of success were still high. Otherwise, Yichen would not have rashly taken on this task.

After glancing around at the Anbu guarding them, Yichen no longer needed to worry about safety and began inscribing the scroll. The result was unexpectedly smooth. In less than fifteen minutes, Yichen completed his scroll successfully in one attempt. After handing it to the Anbu, he saw that the others had not yet finished, so he picked up his brush and made another.

By the time the two scrolls were completed, everyone else had finished as well. At this point, the two Jonin who knew A-rank Sealing Jutsu had also finished learning the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu. Meanwhile, Ōnoki was suppressing the Five-Tails while listening to Bunji explain the details of the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu, since Ōnoki was one of the five people who would perform it.

Next, Ōnoki, the two Jonin, Bunji—who had barely become capable of performing A-rank Sealing Jutsu during this time—and a Jonin from the Barrier Team who only knew B-rank Sealing Jutsu each took a scroll. The five of them positioned themselves in five directions and began preparing the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu.

The Five Elements Sealing Jutsu was actually quite simple to perform. At Yichen's level, if not for his insufficient Chakra, he could have done it too. After all, the task originally meant for one person had been divided among five, so each person only needed to bear part of the burden.

The original difficulty of this jutsu lay in integrating the Chakra of five people. Now, the five scrolls handled that issue, so the entire process went extremely smoothly. Before the Five-Tails could completely break through its original seal, it was easily forced back into Katsuragi's body.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, then became somewhat excited. Tailed beasts were useful as strategic weapons against enemies, but they could also injure their own side from time to time.

Unlike Konoha, Iwagakure did not have Mito Uzumaki, nor did it possess the Sealing Jutsu passed down by the Uzumaki Clan. Iwagakure's A-rank Sealing Jutsu mainly relied on the formidable strength of the person performing it. First suppress the tailed beast, then seal it while it was weakened—the true reliance had never been the Sealing Jutsu itself.

But things were different now. With this Five Elements Sealing Jutsu, one of the village's weaknesses had been greatly made up for. Most importantly, it made the weapon known as a Jinchuriki controllable to a certain extent. Although it was difficult to find five seal masters with Jonin-level strength, with the possibility of sealing a tailed beast as a prerequisite, the village would certainly pay a greater price to train seal masters.

Yichen was also very happy. He was no longer the outsider who had just crossed over. This village had companions and teachers he cherished. He was becoming more and more like a true resident of Iwagakure.

Besides, now that the tailed beast had been successfully sealed, the village would certainly reward him. The greatest advantage of crossing over into Iwagakure rather than Konoha was that after becoming famous, he would not have to worry about Darkness of the Ninja World stabbing him in the back.

By then, the Five-Tails had completely vanished, leaving only a Ninja covered in wounds lying on the ground.

Ōnoki hurriedly called for the Medical Ninja to step forward. The greatest contributor to sealing the Five-Tails this time had actually been Katsuragi. He had kept suppressing the Five-Tails, preventing it from fully going berserk.

Otherwise, once the Five-Tails completely broke free, the difficulty of successfully performing the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu would increase drastically. A fully unleashed Five-Tails could not possibly be restrained in place by Earth Release as easily as before. Ōnoki might be able to trap the Five-Tails for a while if he went all out, but it definitely would not be long enough to perform the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu. Furthermore, if Ōnoki went all out, there would not be enough Jonin left who could perform the sealing.

That was why Ōnoki cared greatly about Katsuragi's safety. But regardless, after this accident, it was impossible for Katsuragi to return to the battlefield as a weapon as before. He had already lost the strength to suppress the Five-Tails. After all, as someone who had become a Jinchuriki during the era of the First Hokage, Katsuragi was no longer young.

"It's time to prepare a new Jinchuriki." Looking at the heavily injured and unconscious Katsuragi, Ōnoki had no choice but to consider the greater good of the village, even though he knew Katsuragi would certainly die after the Jinchuriki was replaced.

Fortunately, the war was over, and the Five-Tails would not be needed anytime soon. The matter could still be delayed for a while.

After Katsuragi's injuries were treated, the Anbu naturally took responsibility for cleaning up the wrecked scene. Yichen returned to the village first with the other members of the Barrier Team.

Although he had learned many Sealing Jutsu, this was actually Yichen's first time witnessing their power. It truly was the most unreasonable form of Ninjutsu in the ninja world. A brief output from five Jonin could trap a tailed beast for a long time. That was far too illogical.

All along the way, Yichen thought about the essence of Sealing Jutsu. First, it was certainly related to Chakra. Second, Sealing Jutsu was a Chakra application completely different from other Ninjutsu. It should be an extremely efficient use of Chakra based on some particular principle.

Perhaps it was similar to a Kekkei Genkai, where two types of Chakra fused to produce a new form of Chakra whose power far exceeded one plus one.

Or perhaps Sealing Jutsu made use of Natural Energy, improving the quality of Chakra.

Unfortunately, neither Natural Energy nor Kekkei Genkai was something Yichen could access at present.

The path of a Ninja was still long. He had only just begun.

The next day, while Yichen was still at home pondering Water Release Transformation, he received a notice to report to Ōnoki at Tsuchikage's Office Building.

Yichen knew that his reward had arrived. Without any delay, he headed straight for Tsuchikage's Office Building.

Looking at Yichen before him, Ōnoki felt somewhat emotional. Although he had known before that Yichen possessed decent talent in Mental Power, Ōnoki had never expected that in only four years, Yichen would reach the point of developing a Sealing Jutsu capable of trapping a tailed beast.

Though Yichen had merely proposed the idea, that alone was astonishing enough. Ōnoki was rather glad that he had pulled strings to let Yichen enter the Barrier Team ahead of time.

"Little Yichen, you did very well this time. You developed the Five Elements Sealing Jutsu and helped the village seal the Five-Tails. The village will grant you one S-rank mission record," Ōnoki said with feeling.

Yichen was somewhat excited. An S-rank mission—how much contribution and money was that worth again?

Before he could recall the reward for an S-rank mission, Ōnoki spoke again. "The village will additionally reward you with permission to exchange for one A-rank Ninjutsu. Considering that you are still far from being able to perform A-rank Ninjutsu, the village has decided that you may choose a reward of equal value instead. Think it over. What do you need?"

Yichen was somewhat surprised. A reward worth the same as an A-rank Ninjutsu—what should he choose?

After thinking for a while, Yichen said, "Lord Tsuchikage, I want to learn how to develop a Kekkei Genkai. Would that be possible?"

Ōnoki was somewhat surprised, then shook his head. "Your Chakra is Water Release and Earth Release. The village has never seen a Kekkei Genkai composed of those two types of Chakra, much less possesses a method to develop one. The only Kekkei Genkai the village can reliably pass down is Explosion Release, and the conditions the village can provide for developing Explosion Release are unsuitable for other Kekkei Genkai."

Although Yichen found that regrettable, he was not too disappointed. He had expected as much. Yichen guessed that Explosion Release might be related to tailed beasts. Besides, according to memories from his previous life, the only Kekkei Genkai ever mentioned as a fusion of Water Release and Earth Release Chakra was Wood Release.

But according to the judgments of some readers, Wood Release was actually the product of Water Release, Earth Release, and Yang Release. Its level would not be lower than the Kekkei Tōta Dust Release.

Whether that claim was true or not, Yichen certainly could not obtain a method to cultivate Wood Release. If he wanted to develop a Kekkei Genkai, he would have to think of another way.

But for now, there really was something Yichen urgently needed that he could request.

"Lord Tsuchikage, my Chakra has already Reached the requirement for performing C-rank Ninjutsu, so I would like to exchange this opportunity for resources to train in C-rank Ninjutsu."

Ōnoki nodded. This was indeed the most common and practical reward. Many Ninja would exchange for it when given the opportunity.

"It's just a little too low," Ōnoki said after thinking for a moment. "You may exchange it for resources for Half C-rank Ninjutsu instead. You can collect the resources directly. As for what results you can achieve after using them, that will depend on your own ability."

Yichen hurriedly nodded. Getting more resources was always a good thing.